15 councillors quit AAP, float new political party

 NEW DELHI: In a major sethack for the Arvind Kejriwal-led Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), 15 party councillors on Saturday resigned from the party's primary mem bership and announced the for mation of a new political outfit -Indraprastha Vikas Party.ct-ing "Internal discontent and stalled development works in the municipal corporation

The blow comes weeks after the AAP lost control over the municipal corporation, and months after it lost the Assembly elections to the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) after being in power with brute majority between 2015 to February 2025

The 15 councillors include senior leader Mukesh Goel, former leader of the MCD house who has served as a municipal councillor for 25 years. In the February state polia, Goel had contested on an AAP ticket from Adarsh Nagar but lost to the BJP.

In a signed letter addressed to the AAP leadership, the council lors alleged that "negligible coor dination with the councillors led 10 the loss of power in MCD "We all municipal councillors were elected on the tickets of AAP in 2022 but despite coming to power is the MCD, the top leadership of the party was Irics pable of smoothly running the MCD. Due to not fulfilling the promises made to the people, we are resigning from the primary membership of the party," the letter, seen by HT, stated.

Besides Goel, the letter bore the signatures of Usha Sharma, Ashok Pandey, Kamal Bhar adwaj, and Devender Kumar, among others.

Refuting the allegations, the AAP blamed the BJP for the res ignations, and claimed that the councillors were offered "15 crore for the same. The BJP denied the allegation.

The development comes weeks after the BJP reclaimed control of MCD with Raja Iqbal Singh winning the mayoral elec ton on April 25. The AAP, which had 110 councillors in the 250 member House at the time, had boycotted the elections To be sure, anti-defection laws are not applicable to municipal councillors.